


counterbalance

by starbox



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Confessions, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Past Adam/Shiro (Voltron), Post-Canon, Post-S7, shiro loves you baby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-07-18 16:44:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16122638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starbox/pseuds/starbox
Summary: It all feels so familiar.Yet everything has changed. Keith’s universe before Voltron had been only the desert he’d known as a child, the cool dark of a flight simulator, and Shiro.Now, the newer cadets’ innocent curiosity seems to bore into his skull wherever he goes. The Paladins all stand out, but Keith more so than the others. Though the rumors buzz quietly, everyone seems to know that the Black Paladin was a former Garrison dropout. And the unwanted attention always makes him feel a little on guard.But the center of his universe remains steadfast; Shiro is the fixed point amid all the swirling stars. So when anything does affect his mentor, Keith senses it acutely. Surrounded by familiar sights and smells, absences become a presence one can feel. And Keith knows there must be one absence in particular that is following Shiro through these halls.





	counterbalance

Shiro, despite all he’s been through, looks just as frustratingly handsome in the grey officers’ uniform as he had before Kerberos. Keith, from his perch on the main hangar balcony, notes this as stoically as he can. Below, the captain is busy instructing a number of cadets on the use of Altean-modified flight stabilizers. He doesn’t know Keith is there, or he’s doing a very good job at pretending not to. With Shiro, it’s sometimes hard to tell.    

After the initial restoration efforts, everyone at the Galaxy Garrison has fallen back into a temporary schedule filled with logistics meetings, classes, and flight drills. Keith is a stickler for routine when he thinks it’s necessary, but something about this repetition is starting to wear a bit thin.

He remembers this area well, with its scorching sunlight and sluggish, dry wind. Even the towering fluffy clouds look the same--pulling his gaze up away from the sand to the sky he loves to be in. It all feels so familiar.

Yet everything has changed. Keith’s universe before Voltron had been only the desert he’d known as a child, the cool dark of a flight simulator, and Shiro.

Now, the newer cadets’ innocent curiosity seems to bore into his skull wherever he goes. The Paladins all stand out, but Keith more so than the others. Though the rumors buzz quietly, everyone seems to know that the Black Paladin was a former Garrison dropout. And the unwanted attention always makes him feel a little on guard.

But the center of his universe remains steadfast; Shiro is the fixed point amid all the swirling stars. So when anything does affect his mentor, Keith senses it acutely. Surrounded by familiar sights and smells, absences become a presence one can feel. And Keith knows there must be one absence in particular that is following Shiro through these halls.

 

Keith distinctly remembers the moment he first saw Shiro and Adam together. They had been chatting with a flight instructor about a drill and when she had left, they had continued discussing the flight plan. But the moment it was just the two of them, their body language had completely altered. Shiro had leaned into Adam’s space as Adam’s hand came to rest possessively on Shiro’s lower back. Even then, Keith—fourteen and socially awkward—knew that Adam was different. Adam pulled Shiro in with a magnetism that, each time he witnessed it, made Keith feel even more immature and useless.   

Adam had taught one of Keith’s lectures and he had remained a strict personality in class and outside it. He and Shiro had shared a love for doing things _the right way_ that a younger Keith had never understood. Adam had demanded a lot of himself and those around him; most of the time, Shiro responded well to that. But Shiro saw both his imperfections (physical or otherwise) and those in others, not as flaws, but rather as challenges to overcome. Keith could never escape the feeling that when Adam turned that assessing gaze on him—the scrapes on his knuckles, the rebellion in his eyes—he had wanted to pull Keith apart and put him back together as the ideal little cadet. Adam had believed in perfection; Shiro had believed in progress. And Keith, if he had believed in anything back then, only believed in Shiro.

              

Captain Shirogane’s lecture looks like it is winding down, so Keith unfolds himself from the railing and jogs down the stairs to the main floor. He sees the majority of the cadets heading off to their next assignments while a few stay to ask questions. Shiro listens to their inquiries patiently, even doodling a chart for one student. Ten minutes later, Keith decides to park himself on the hood of a nearby jeep and make his presence known. Interestingly, the last few questions take less time than the previous ones.

Shiro glances over his shoulder and shakes his head. “I’m going to guess you aren’t here on assignment.”

“Let’s take a break,” suggests Keith.

Shiro looks nonplussed. “From what?”

“You’ve been teaching classes pretty much nonstop for about six hours. Let’s use the officers’ lounge up there.” Keith jabs a thumb toward the second floor he had just come from.

“Did you get a major promotion I haven’t heard about?” Shiro teases.

“Oh come on, that’s never stopped us before.”

“True,” Shiro acquiesces, and gives Keith’s shoulder a squeeze as he walks toward the stairs. “Let’s go.”

Once inside the empty lounge, Shiro sits down on a bench by the window. The moment he does, his shoulders slope and he starts to roll his neck stiffly. Keith snatches the holographic officer’s ID from where it’s clipped to his data pad. Shiro watches him, head tilted to the side, as he goes to the vending machines in the corner.

“Ah, you’re just doing this to get free food out of me again, aren’t you?”

Keith makes an offended face (which loses all impact with the ID held in his mouth) and places a hot coffee in front of the other man. He has a juice box for himself, because he refuses to let Lance convince him it’s possible to outgrow juice and his half-Galra metabolism seems to like steady sugar. He sits next to Shiro in companionable quiet as the late afternoon sunlight grows redder.

When Keith finally breaks the silence, he does so bluntly. “You sleeping okay?”

Shiro smiles at him. “That obvious, huh?”

“Only to me.”

Shiro hums an affirmative sound and takes a sip of coffee.

“Are there not enough instructors or what?” The question comes out more confrontational that Keith meant it to, but he is annoyed that anyone would saddle Shiro with grading papers when he could be piloting the Atlas.

“You know me, I like to be helpful.”

“Sure…” Keith watches his mentor’s face as he stares deep into the coffee cup.

Shiro glances back up at him. “Not going to let this go, are you?”

Keith’s dark eyebrows scrunch together as he nods wordlessly.

After a quiet sigh, Shiro relents. “The truth is, if I’m busy, I don’t have time to think about things I’d rather not.”

“Shiro…”

“It’s decidedly not my best coping technique.”

“What if we take the hover bikes out to the hills? Or you could hit the gym or something...”

Shiro takes another sip of coffee, eyebrows raised.

“My mom recommended the gym a day ago, but I’d rather spar,” Keith confesses. “I’m going a little crazy, too.”

The older man nods, understanding. “Thank you, Keith.”

“I _know_ you know what you’re doing. You’re an adult after all,” Keith says slowly. 

“You are too,” replies Shiro, expression fond. “And I trust you absolutely. I know you would rather cut off my arm than let me get away with making bad decisions.”

Keith blanches and chokes on the juice. Shiro immediately starts patting him on the back as he coughs wetly.

“I’m sorry”--a soft laugh--“but you know I’m joking, right?”

“Shi... ro,” Keith sputters, eyes wide.

Shiro continues slowly rubbing Keith’s back, but he’s losing the struggle to hide the amusement tugging at his lips. Shiro’s dark sense of humor is one of the countless things Keith loves about him, but they still haven’t properly talked about that fight and, honestly, bringing up dismemberment right now is _a lot_.

Shiro’s gaze has drifted out the window and Keith knows he’s watching the sunset disappear behind the sharp hills, because that’s what he always did when they sat up here. Keith also knows it’s coming, whatever Shiro really wants to say. He can almost feel it on the air—the way things become tense and muted before desert thunderstorms.

“Seeing Adam’s name on that wall,” Shiro starts quietly. “And hearing about it from Iverson--sure, it was horrible, but it didn’t feel real. Only now is it really hitting me. I feel like I’m going to run into him in the mess hall, or catch him reserving all the best computers in the lab. I expect him to be here and... he’s just not. Even if we weren’t together anymore, I wanted to see him... He was my--” He clamps his mouth shut and the muscles in his jaw twitch.

Keith scoots closer and lays a hand on Shiro’s forearm.

“I feel it too,” Keith whispers. “We’re back in this place, but everything is off.”

Shiro nods, still not in control enough to want to keep talking. He’s staring rather resolutely at a corner of the ceiling, eyes dangerously shiny. Keith watches him for a few minutes then speaks again.

“It was like that with my pop, you know. I didn’t cry at his funeral. But days, weeks after, something stupidly normal would happen—didn’t matter if it was good or bad—and I’d realize my dad was gone for good. I’d just start bawling wherever I was… People probably thought I was nuts.”

He huffs a self-deprecating laugh. It’s the first time he’s ever told anyone this. He hasn’t even told Krolia, and probably never will because he knows how it would hurt her.

“I’m so sorry.” Shiro is suddenly focused, placing his hand over Keith’s.

Keith shakes his head. “It’s okay… My point is, it just takes time. Like with everything, it takes patience—as I learned from someone important to me.”

Shiro fixes him with a searching look. There are dark circles under his clear grey eyes, but it doesn’t look like he’s going to cry anymore. Maybe someday, but not today. Keith swears to himself he’ll be there though. Whenever Shiro needs him.

After a few moments, Shiro says quietly, “Have I told you recently, how proud I am of you?”

Keith’s cheeks grow warm, his glance wanders.

“Not in so many words,” he murmurs. “But I mean, I _know_.”

“Oh you do, do you?”

Shiro’s voice takes on a familiar teasing lilt, so Keith peers through his bangs at him. His face has relaxed and he picks up Keith’s hand to envelop it in both his own—warm skin and cool machinery.

“So you know exactly what I think of you, hm?” he asks.

He rests his fingers, bunched, in the calloused center of Keith’s upturned palm for a moment before he stretches out his hand. The gesture, fingers moving across Keith’s palm, tickles and sends paralyzing sparks up his spine. Shiro completely flattens his left palm to Keith’s. His hand is definitely still bigger, but now his fingers are only a bit longer. Keith can’t look away from their hands together, and licks his lips.

Shiro continues his rhetorical scrutiny. “So you know then, how brave I think you are? How selfless and kind? You know exactly how much I admire the leader you've become..?”

Keith swallows and it sounds so loud. Shiro pushes Keith’s unresisting fingers apart and threads his between them. He curls his hand closed around Keith’s and Keith responds with a jerk, grabbing back instinctually.

“And do you know how it thrills me to watch you fly? Or how sweet you look when you talk to your wolf? Or that, I can’t imagine how my life would be without you?”

Keith wonders vaguely if he’s stopped breathing and passed out and this is all a hallucination. But he can feel Shiro’s hand in his and when he squeezes it, Shiro’s grip is firm and real. He leans in, cupping Keith’s cheek in his right hand—it’s comforting on Keith’s hot skin—and looks him straight in the eyes. His expression is tender but his voice has become deadly earnest.

“Do you really understand, Keith, how much I love you?”

Keith tries to gulp some air into his constricted lungs but it turns into a surprised sob. Shiro brushes fingers across his cheek.

“I love you, Keith. I love you, too.”

Shiro pauses for an agonizing moment, then tips Keith’s chin up with just the slightest pressure and kisses him softly. Keith is blinking rapidly, vision blurring, but he lunges forward, chasing Shiro’s retreating lips. Shiro subtly guides him and they’re kissing again, deeper, but all Keith wants is more. It’s not even close to enough after waiting this long.

His face is wet with what must be tears, which, he thinks, is the verifiable _worst_. But he’s also kissing Shiro, which is a top-five life goal that was looking unattainable even just a couple months ago. Far too soon though, Shiro is pulling away.

“You need to breathe, buddy. Even you can’t persevere your way out of breathing.”

Keith gasps and it turns into a hiccup, which makes him groan at the unfairness of the universe. That is until Shiro carefully brushes Keith’s bangs away from his sweaty forehead to plant a quick kiss there. So the universe is great, but he’s a _mess._

“I didn’t know if you— _hic_ —dammit. This _isn’t_ how I planned...” mumbles Keith.

Shiro chuckles quietly at this. “Come here, baby.”

He pulls Keith into a tight hug, right arm cradling his back. Keith hides his face in the curve of Shiro’s neck. He sniffles for a few more minutes, then pulls away, rubbing at his eyes.

“Okay, alright,” Keith says. “Sorry…”

Shiro shakes his head. “I’m just lucky to have you.”

Keith narrows his eyes, a rousing pep talk imminent.

“No, stop that,” scolds Shiro, but he’s smiling. “Listen…”

Keith straightens up as the other man takes his hand again.

“I always do, Shiro.”

The captain raises a sharp eyebrow at this, but continues nonetheless.

“Thanks for hearing me out. I mean it, I trust you absolutely. But I know this must be sort of rough for you to listen to, all things considered.” His expression is questioning and faintly guilty.

“I’d rather it be me than anyone else,” blurts Keith. Then he adds quickly, “You know I’m always here for you.”

“That you are.” Shiro reaches out and tucks a wavy strand of hair behind Keith’s ear.

“Yep, you’re stuck with me now.” Keith is joking, but he can’t help the traitorous tinge of hope in his voice.

“Oh, I’m counting on that,” replies Shiro. He leans down with a smile and Keith eagerly moves to meet him halfway for another kiss.

Nothing will ever stay the same. It wouldn’t be life if it did. But Keith finally thinks he’s strong enough to make the most of that. Sometimes finding equilibrium isn’t something that comes to you on your own. Maybe you only attain balance when reaching out to give someone else a hand to hold on to.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't remember Shiro using "Kosmo" for Keith's space wolf... and I think that if Keith doesn't call him yet then Shiro wouldn't either.
> 
> Thanks for reading my fic! I'm on twitter @lostshounen so say hi if you want~


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